News,views, nonsense and opinion from Whitstable Harbour Village, marketing, selling and being local.

Thursday, 19 September 2013

Public appeal to Whitstable Harbour Board

This is an urgent pubic appeal to the Chairman and members
of Whitstable Harbour Board who meet at Whitstable Castle tomorrow.

We have never met most of the members of Whitstable Harbour Board, despite having been tenants
in the harbour for more than six years. We have never been invited to
participate at any of their meetings, parts of which are conducted in secret and
we are not sent the minutes even when they are discussing our businesses. Like
most people in the town we are not entirely sure what they do or what they want to do.
We can only see that over the last seven years, they have not achieved a great
deal in terms of developing the harbour, except the commissioning of a steady line of consultancy firms who
inevitably conclude that nothing is feasible without further consultancy.

Arguably, one of the Board’s most successful decisions was agreeing
to the creation of a local producers market on the South Quay in 2006, which gradually
developed into what is now Whitstable Harbour Village. Now those 33 local
businesses, many of whom are dependent on the Village for their family’s
livlihood, find themselves completely at the mercy of the Board for their future
security.

During those seven years, the Harbour Village has proved
itself as a powerful business incubator and more than 20 businesses across Whitstable
and East Kent have hatched out of the Village. Nine of them are part of the
vibrant independent shopping scene in Whitstable that help make the town so successful. We have become a powerful visitor
attraction with visitors from Europe, North America and Asia all offering
praise for what we do. People say we are
local, quirky and authentic which is a key part of why they visit Whitstable
and it’s working harbour.

More recently we have successfully achieved Stage 1 approval
from the Coastal Communities Fund for £86,000 to create a young entrepreneurs hub
at the Village. This means ten new jobs for local youngsters who find it so
tough to get decent employment or get a business idea going. Our project has
been copied in other towns and many other local authorities ask us how they can
set up something similar to regenerate their region.

At the risk of blowing our own trumpet too hard, we are a
local community business success story in tough economic times and we would
have hoped that the Board and Canterbury City Council would be anxious to secure our long term future in the harbour.

Instead, after endless emails and requests for clarification, the Board, decided in private on July 19th that we would be offered
a lease renewal but that the Council would retain the right to evict all 33
businesses given 12 months notice. The minutes (if you can obtain a copy) state that they will not cede “flexibility”
for future South Quay developments.

We interpret that as “we will allow you to stay for now but
will kick you out as soon we get a more attractive offer”. Presumably, that is their definition of supporting
local business but it creates huge uncertainty and anxiety for hard working local people and even more tragically
means that progressing the young entrepreneurs hub is impossible. The deadline for final submissions is October
7th and time is running out fast for ten young people’s business
start ups.

We have even suggested a flexibility clause in the new lease
so that if, later down the line, a big exciting development opportunity is approved and needs to encroach on our
existing site, the Council can retain the legal right to re-locate us. That seems a pretty fair and simple compromise.

Our plight has been on the front page of the local press and
has been the lead story of BBC Radio Kent. It has attracted over 300 signatures
on a petition in less than 3 weeks and has been tweeted & re-tweeted and generated
nearly 200 new Likes on our Facebook page. This blog has achieved over 6000 page views. We have received the formal backing of the Whitstable Chamber of
Commerce, our local MP, Julian Brazier and respected community groups like the local
Lions club, who we work with on local community events. Last night, we even provoked the support
of local street artist Catman (see photo). Despite this
groundswell of public support, one of the few local organisations that we have not heard from is the Harbour Board. Only one councillor has taken any
interest in our future at all.

Tomorrow is the next Harbour Board meeting and we are
allowed only three minutes to state our case to the board. They are under no
obligation to even listen to us, we are not allowed to record the meeting and will not hear
what (if anything) they discuss in private about our future. That, it seems, is local democracy in action.

So as a successful community business that boosts the local
economy, attracts funding and creates jobs, we are reduced to begging to the board in the hope that someone will
see sense and make a constructive, bold and positive decision that sends a
clear and welcome message to the people of Whitstable and beyond. Specifically, we humbly request the members of Whitstable Harbour Board to make
three simple instructions to their officers at the Council:

1. 1.Grant a standard 10 year commercial lease to Whitstable
Harbour Village so that it has a secure place in the harbour’s medium term
future.

2. 2. Ensure that there is reasonable flexibility
clause in the lease that allows the Council to relocate the Village at 12 month
notice in the event that a major development is approved and that the same development
requires part or all the current Harbour Village site.

3. 3. Include a clause that commits the Council to
consult with the tenant on all major new developments and renovations and that
where it is reasonable and possible- endeavour to make disruption to the tenant’s
business minimal.

These three simple and reasonable instructions would allow the Board to
retain full flexiblity without strangling the progress of a flourishing business (that they allowed to be born back in 2006) and risk putting over 33 people on
benefits.

And if these three simple instructions are impossible for any reason, we request that the Board at least have the common courtesy to tell us at the meeting tomorrow what it is that they have in mind which is a better than the Harbour Village and
what it is that we have to do to win their long term support that we are not already doing.

After six years of hard work contributing to the vibrancy of
the harbour and the town surely, we at least deserve that. Thank you.